He returned to Portugal to play for União de Leiria, Beira-Mar and Santa Clara, before spending 2003 to 2010 back with Vitória Setúbal.
[3] His first-team debut came on 29 September 1994, when he came on as a 66th-minute substitute for Paulo Gomes in a 3–0 defeat to Gil Vicente at the Estádio Adelino Ribeiro Novo.
[3] He played a further 21 top-flight matches in the 1996–97 campaign, where he was spotted by Leeds United manager George Graham, who had been scouting Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink.
He also captained the club in the 2005 Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira, as Vitória lost 1–0 to Benfica; he was replaced by Antonio Franja on 75 minutes.
[6] Ribeiro gradually lost his importance in the squad in the 2007–08 season, though he scored the 1–0 winner with a long-range effort against Sporting CP on 24 February.
[14] He returned to Vitória Setúbal in January 2015, taking over from Domingos Paciência,[15] and managed to steer the club away from relegation at the end of the 2014–15 season despite only winning three of his 17 games in charge.
[18] However, Ludogorets recorded three losses in Ribeiro's first three matches, including elimination from the UEFA Champions League qualifying rounds and defeat in the 2015 Bulgarian Supercup, and he was sacked after less than two months in charge with the club claiming it was a "disciplinary sacking and unilateral termination of the contract" due to "his prolonged absence from the job despite a standing and binding contract".
[19] Ribeiro stated that the club signed players without his knowledge and the sporting director further eroded his authority by interfering in training sessions.
[21] In February 2016, Ribeiro returned to Portugal and signed a contract at LigaPro side Académico de Viseu to run until the end of the 2016–17 season.
[25] He oversaw a complete overhaul of the playing staff, signing an influx of foreign talent including Rigino Cicilia, Anthony de Freitas, Kjell Knops, Calvin Mac-Intosch, Quentin Pereira, Kiko, Carlos Saleiro, Paulo Tavares, Chris Mbamba, Sébastien Amoros, Miguel Santos, and Gëzim Shalaj; as well as British players Anton Forrester and Jerome Thomas, Nathan Ferguson, and Martin Paterson; with Alex Jones and Sam Hart also joining on loan.
[28] He appointed Jak Alnwick, Ben Purkiss and Anthony Grant as joint-captains, and got off to a good start by winning his first six home games at Vale Park.
[30] However, they entered Christmas in 17th-place, leaving chairman Norman Smurthwaite to declare that 'Plan B' had been triggered, meaning the signing of "seasoned, higher grade" players, whilst he admitted he felt "a little bit hoodwinked" as Ribeiro's friends in the game (José Mourinho, Aitor Karanka, and Carlos Carvalhal) had provided him with glowing references but had thus far failed to lend any of their players to the Vale.
[33] Assistant manager Michael Brown took charge on a caretaker basis, but could not arrest the decline as the club went on to be relegated at the end of the 2016–17 season.
[34] Ribeiro was appointed head coach at Campeonato de Portugal club Salgueiros on 6 April 2017 following the sacking of Filipe Cândido.
On 14 November 2017, Ribeiro was appointed as the new head coach at Cova da Piedade, who were in the relegation places of the LigaPro after picking up only 13 points from their first 13 games.
[41] On 7 October, he was appointed as manager of former club Salgueiros, now in the Porto FA Elite Division (fourth tier), until the end of the 2017–18 season.